Mini work-bench

I started writing this ages ago, during lock-down. A second lock-down seems imminent now, so I may as well publish it anyway. In any case I did make something, which I'm now looking to make more flexible, and reading this again will remind me of my original ideas.

At the timer there was s a bit of a fad on you-tube: the mini work-bench:


The circumstances made these really attractive. I guess, hence the fad.

This would likely work for me later too: I would generally have a really small workspace, where I have a desk, where I might sit down and solder, etc, and I would get this out on the desk to do wood working.

However, I don't have access to most of the facilities I need to build one. It would be vastly better to buy something, however all I've found is this which is small and rather expensive.

So the question is how to make something with a small set of hand tools at my disposal...

These either use, or make enormous blocks of hardwood. I was thinking about getting a folding workbench, which might, at most use 25mm wood for it's jaws, and I don't think they have a lot more support, so perhaps this is alright. Perhaps I can just use 25mm plywood, and some spacers to attach a small vice.

The main feature is this vice, combined with the clamping dogs.

The Adrian Preda bench doubles as a shooting board, which is a great space saver. I'd like that too. In fact that basic design is terrifically simple, If I happened to have such a massive lump of timber lying around.

There's also this which requires a specialised accessory: the side clamps that fit in the dog holes, but is then extremely versatile. It could be used with a track saw to make square cuts, as well. It's not as easy to store as the other options.

A problem I have is I don't have access to a drill press to drill the dog holes with.

A single big lump of timber isn't that expensive, but the shipping adds a lot to the cost. I could by a bunch of 2x1 from a local hardware store, and glue them together into a single surface. My magnetic saw guide will deal with each piece accurately, and the ends don't really need to be that square or flat anyway: one end I just need to get the vice attached square and I can just line that up carefully when gluing.

I'd need to plane the surface flat, so I would need a plane, which I mean to get anyway.

Maybe I should just be less ambitious and make a bench hook to do the bit of sawing I need to do right now, and perhaps leave this for later.

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